Fractured
by kim-onka
Summary: Elladan carries his mother out of the Orc caves and into the light of the day. / The family of Imladris after Celebrían's capture and rescue, until she departs to the West.


There, I finally live up to my avatar ;) The impulse to finally write this down was provided by the All In The Family Exchange on AO3.

Enjoy!

* * *

Elladan carries his mother out of the Orc caves and into the light of the day.

He holds Celebrían as steadily as his trembling arms allow; he presses her limp body against his chest at once gently and firmly, but most of all, desperately.

He holds Celebrían in his arms, hence he does not see the merciless light of Anar accentuate each lesion and split on her face, nor the blood and dirt in her matted hair, nor the broken nails of the hand she raises feebly to shield her eyes.

Instead, the image before his vision is of his mother down there, in the Orc caves, before he covered her with his cloak; in his ears, the few words exchanged ring loudly.

 _Tell me what you want me to do to them, Mother._ This was the first sentence he managed to force out of his constricted throat.

 _No,_ she answered, with difficulty, after a while; or perhaps it only seemed to Elladan they had been staring at each other through the darkness for a long time. And her eyes seemed not to recognise him, not fully. _No!,_ she cried, and he did not know, then, whether she was even addressing him; the one thing he knew at that moment was that he had to take her out, right then, before he thinks of avenging her, this was more important, the most important.

( _And he ought to have known; ought to have taken her out at once, not allowing her to remain there a moment longer. He ought to have._ )

The Elves call for retreat: the Lady of Imladris has been liberated, it is time to return. Elrohir hurries after his brother, a strangled sound escapes him; Elladan pays him no mind, ignores everything and everyone except for Celebrían and the thought, now the only thought: to deliver her to Imladris.

To deliver her home.

Someone is calling; someone wants to clean and treat Celebrían's wounds, to bring her relief, if only a little, then and there; Elladan barely hears them, his mother is shaking in his arms, Elrohir is yelling, trying to halt him, yet does he not see that no-one may be allowed to look at Celebrían battered and broken, not these others – not at his mother, who is sacred in his eyes – but Elrohir was not there, he does not know – but Elladan will protect her, hold onto her, save her.

(In the end, he only allows his brother to touch her – and never abandons his grasp on her throughout the ministrations.)

(He takes her home.)

* * *

Arwen touches her brother's arm. She is on the verge of tears, yet she addresses him with forced calm, with only an edge of anguish in her voice.

"Let go," she begs. "You are home, Elladan, it is all right, let go of Mother, so Father may heal her..."

But it is not all right.

Celebrían has since fainted in her son's arms and is resting fitfully in his embrace, and Elladan holds her fast, reluctant to hand her over to anyone, even to Elrond, as if in a not fully realised fear that she may fall apart if he so much as relaxes his tight grip on her, in the likeness of a broken glass figurine held together in a palm's grasp.

(Something will end, if he releases her.)

When he is finally persuaded to lay her down on the bed in the one of the House's healing chambers, it appears to him that she truly does scatter before his eyes, and he looks in renewed horror at her battered features and form as lifeless as he has never seen her in his life.

He stares at her numbly, until Arwen pulls him away.

(Something does end when he releases her: his sense of purpose.)

(Now, only grief remains to him, and guilt.)

* * *

(Celebrían succumbs restlessly to dark dreams, and memories; from amongst the shadow a voice calls her, the voice she recognises and loves, and yet it resounds but as faint echo, muted by the mists around her.)

(There is relief, yet mostly into numbness.)

Elrond calls out to his wife again and again, and his voice grows fainter; away she is, away from his reach.

(The bond between them draws her into light, yet him even further into hollow darkness.)

* * *

It takes all of Elrond's mastery and love and more, and even then it is not enough; Celebrían's wounds are closed, her body is healed, and yet her spirit remains dimmed, her manner apathetic.

Nevertheless, slowly she returns to a semblance of health, to a semblance of life.

She considers herself and her surroundings: the impression is half of familiarity, half of strangeness.

Healed.

She is healed.

She does not feel healed.

Celebrían remembers, with stark quality, each wound and abrasion, each fracture on her being, fëa and hröa alike; she perceives them still, each and every one, covered and concealed, sealed and faded, and yet still apparent, even if none were to see them.

Elrond sees, she thinks. He is all too aware of what he could not mend in me, and it hurts him deeply.

So deeply.

Elrond seldom departs from her side as she rests numbly on the sofa in their chambers, day after day after day; he would guide her through every step towards recovery, were she ready to take even one. Yet she is not, and her husband, joined to her in fëa as in hröa, all the same cannot reach her; he can only keep her company in the barren ruins of their shared life.

(If Celebrían had it in herself to weep, she would weep for his pain even before her own.)

The only brief spells of forgetfulness he manages to grant her come in the form of music – the soft tones of his harp fill her hollow self, and it is the most wonderful gift he could offer them both.

(She knows where he learnt it.)

* * *

Galadriel and Celeborn arrive, bringing with them the warmth of golden Lothlórien and the sweet smell of its flowers; long hours do they spend by their daughter's side, more often than not in silence and in memories and in sorrow; and they cannot reach her, either.

She sits between them, quiet and distant, and that, too, hurts her; and that, too, she cannot help.

One day Arwen leads her mother to the windows and pulls her hands into the warm patch of the Sun; and it seems to Celebrían the rays pass through her flesh, catching only on the lines marking its breaking; and she withdraws her hands rapidly, startling the younger Elleth.

(She cannot go on, and cannot return to where she was before; she wants to scream, but there is not sound enough in her.)

* * *

"You do not visit your mother," Celeborn states, gazing questioningly at Elladan and Elrohir. "She is concerned. Surely it is not your intention to add to her sorrow."

Arwen looks evenly at her brothers; she is aware of the reason they have been avoiding Celebrían, as well as of the fact that even in her apathetic state, their mother is concerned.

"Come see Mother," she implores them quietly, "please. It is not your fault."

They look at her sharply, but say nothing.

(They do not come.)

* * *

"I cannot bear it," says Celebrían, and her voice is toneless and tight; Elrond looks at her with concern.

"What, my love?" he asks softly.

The only answer she gives is a vague gesture with her hand; he takes it gently, caresses her fingers.

"You are free now, Celebrían," he tells her, "you are free," he repeats, "you are free," over and over again, like a lullaby to ease her anxiety, like a charm to convince them both.

But his wife shakes her head.

"We shall never be free," she says. "Our children, perhaps. But not us. We are both – I by destiny, you by choice – tied to this world. And yet you," she continues, her voice rising slightly in a hollow imitation of her usual agitation, "you had a chance to be free. And you rejected it. I do not understand."

Silence greets her words, as her husband seeks his own.

"Do you wish for death, Celebrían?" he inquires at last.

"I wish for a release from the bonds of a world that was marred at its dawn. I wish for a release from myself, for I too have been marred."

"Are we not all marred?"

"We are," she concedes, "and yet my marring goes beyond that." She encircles the wrist of her right hand with fingers of her left. "Did you not tell me, you and my mother both, that this was how he would speak of himself?"

"So he would," Elrond admits quietly, as the image of his wife, weak and pale nearly to the point of transparency, clashes with the haunting memory of Maedhros' scarred, hollow face.

He does no want to compare the two, in any manner.

"Perhaps suffering inflicted by Morgoth was unparalleled," she says, as if in response to his thoughts. "Yet I was raised under Middle Earth's Sun, not in the light of the Two Trees of Valinor. The world wilts, and so do its children."

And so it does, and she is, he thinks, wilted, the silver flower of Lothlórien wasted in the cruel darkness of Orc caves.

* * *

One day Elrond leaves Celebrían alone in their chambers and upon his return finds her on the floor, with her forehead pressed against the cold floor.

She is unable to explain it to him.

* * *

"Where are your brothers?" Celebrían asks of Arwen, who is combing her mother's hair.

The younger Elleth hesitates, her hands still.

"I do not know for certain," she answers. "They go oft to view the Valley."

"They will not come see me."

There is no response.

"Help me rise, daughter," says Celebrían.

Arwen obeys quietly; she helps her mother dress and finishes doing her hair, all the while touching her lightly, with utmost care, as though she could be damaged by even slightly careless contact. Celebrían recognises the manner: it is the same manner in which Elrond has been touching her, and her heart aches, yet she bears it, for she herself does not know it to be wrong.

(The dress hides most of the fractures, and it should hold her together for long enough.)

The younger Elleth leads her mother out of her chambers, and so the Lady of Imladris walks its hallways for the first time after her return; the denizens stop in their ways to bow before her in respectful, mournful, dedicated silence.

If she could, Celebrían would smile then, at them, for them; but her face feels too fragile for smiles still, as if the slightest smile could be the crack to make it shatter; instead, she feels like crying, for she finds herself out of place here, in her own house, alien in the halls, a stranger among the people who love her so.

(She does not cry, either.)

She walks on.

They find Elladan and Elrohir on a balcony overlooking the Valley; the startled brothers stare at their mother in disbelief and something resembling fear.

Celebrían steps away from Arwen and approaches them slowly, looking from one to the other; suddenly, it is difficult for her to speak, even to stand.

Nevertheless, she has come here for a reason.

"You have not come to me," she says, "my sons. I… have come to you. My children."

"Mother!"

"I wanted to… thank you." She pauses to regard them, to give them a chance to react, even to protest; to gather her own strength. They remain speechless. "And… you should never have seen me as you have," she continues in her empty tone, although the sorrow is all too real. "I regret you have."

"We should never have allowed—!" Elrohir cries, while Elladan shakes his head. "We should have— Mother, forgive us, for not finding you sooner, for allowing you to—"

The slightest wince passes through Celebrían's numb features.

"I have nothing to forgive you for," she says. "Only... evade me no longer."

They bow to her then, and Celebrían walks over to stand between them, leans against the balustrade and surveys the Valley.

She closes her eyes against the light wind on her face as her sons move to steady her.

She still feels empty.

* * *

The Lady of the Golden wood looks at her daughter with solemn concern; her heart is heavy.

"If Elrond has not healed you until now, he will not," she says. "And if he has not managed, no one on this side of the Sea will."

"Do not think I blame him," Galadriel adds when her daughter does not answer. "I could not blame him. However, the truth remains. Consider this, I beseech you, Celebrían, you know there is no life for you here. You can feel it."

"Here is my whole life, Mother," says Celebrían; there is more feeling in her voice than has been for a long time, and it breaks; and in Galadriel's wise eyes the Lady of Imladris recognises the truth she already knows, but does not wish to acknowledge: No more.

It is then that Celebrían weeps – only then, and Galadriel watches her in silence.

She was unable to mourn what had been done to her – not truly, not yet – but this she can: the destruction of the life she had, the realisation it cannot be returned, the further grief and loneliness of her family.

And mourn she does.

* * *

"I have to depart," she says, and her voice is toneless again, but sadness appears on her face; a shadow of pain, all too familiar, passes Elrond's features. "A ship will take me where I shall be healed in truth."

I think you know, say her eyes. I think you have known for a long time.

I have, say his eyes. I have.

"I cannot go with you, Celebrían," he says aloud. "My task here is not done."

"I know."

The reality of parting settles between them.

"I have failed you," he says.

Celebrían shakes her head.

"I believed I would be the one not to leave you behind," she whispers.

He takes her hands in his.

"Do not concern yourself with me," he begs, yet his wife gazes at him sombrely.

"You and our children are the only ones I am able to concern myself with," she says.

They begin the preparations.

* * *

"Your family shall welcome you," Galadriel tells her.

My family is who I am deserting, thinks Celebrían, but says nothing. Arwen is sitting by her, her dark head resting on Celebrían's lap.

Galadriel smiles sadly.

"It would be foolish to expect excitement on your part," she admits, "but remember, as the daughter of Artanis and the wife of Elrond, Valinor is your home. I am certain you shall find it such."

Not until he is with me, thinks Celebrían, but says nothing.

(Elrond does not speak of any family in Valinor, and Celebrían is not surprised.)

* * *

Soon, a company is assembled to escort the Lady of Imladris to the Undying Lands. At Celebrían's insistence, she says her hardest farewells at the very beginning of her journey, in the Last Homely House itself.

Her parents are the least distressed; Galadriel is calm as ever, betraying only a tinge of sadness that her daughter would precede her in the journey home, and under such grim circumstances; Celeborn, confident with his age's wisdom and his wife's faith, endeavours to reassure his daughter, unaware that she only has one concern.

"Take care of them," she asks of her parents, "in my stead."

And no more needs to be said to the Lord and Lady of the Golden Wood.

Her children, on other hand, struggle to maintain their composure even as tears glisten in their eyes, each of the three; Celebrían can scarcely believe she will not see them for many long years, and may not see them ever again.

"Elladan, Elrohir, Arwen," she addresses them. "I have something to ask of you."

They look at her intently, as if in an attempt to preserve her image in their eyes, a desperate fear of parting.

"It may be I shall not see you again," she begins. Arwen's eyes widen, the brothers glance between themselves in surprise. "And so I ask of you: choose wisely. Do not look to me; look into your hearts and go where they lead you, even if it is away from me. Remember. You have my blessings."

"Yes, mother," Arwen whispers. She is crying openly now; Elladan and Elrohir nod mutely.

Celebrían embraces her daughter and looks to her sons.

"To you I also say this: do not blame yourselves." She sees understanding on their faces, and a flicker of protestation. "Do this for me," she adds.

They nod again, in unison.

After this, there is little more to be said, and what is to be said, she whispers to each separately before turning to face Elrond.

"You I shall see again for certain," she says quietly, "for you have bound yourself to the marred world, and to me, who am now also destroyed."

"Do not say so," he says, "when we see each other, you shall be healed in truth, as much as any one can be in the world to which we are bound; and we shall be together."

"And yet I am glad," she continues, as if not hearing him, "that you did not bind yourself to the world for my sake."

"I would have, and deemed it worthy," he says, but she only shakes her head, and says nothing, only embraces him; and so comes the most painful moment, yet eventually she steps way, pulls her hands form his, and sets on a journey beyond Middle-Earth, Celebrían, daughter of Celeborn and Galadriel, wife of Elrond, Lady of Imladris.


End file.
